Under 13 East Devon League
Uplyme Youth 1 - Ottery St Mary 1One one thriller !
Last Sunday Uplyme Youth, third in the East Devon League, drew at home to league leaders Ottery St Mary in a thrilling match that could have gone either way.

On a cold and dull Sunday Ottery kicked off downhill and went on the attack. Only good, assertive keeping from Uplyme’s Bret James in the first three minutes kept the scoresheet clean. However a minute later, from a well executed corner kick and a superb headed ball Ottery went one up. Uplyme quickly responded when, from a big boot up field from Callum Taylor found Jack Heath who got a shot in but went wide. Ottery attacked again and, after a defensive mistake by Uplyme, put a shot wide. They then followed on with a near repeat of their earlier headed goal. Following an Ottery free kick and two corners Uplyme put together some passes which ended with a Johnnie Turner pass to Sam Jones who ran the ball through the Ottery defence and put it in the back of the net. After the restart Uplyme again went on the attack but were deemed offside. Ottery came back, braking through the Uplyme defence and only brave keeping by James prevented them scoring from a two on one situation. More goal area pressure from Ottery saw a certain goal saved by a characteristic well-timed volley off the goal-line by Uplyme’s George Heath. The last ten minutes of the first half produced excitement at both ends with run-throughs and shots by Uplyme’s Josh Armytage and Jones and several more good saves from their keeper. The half-time score was 1 – 1.

The second half saw a similar pattern to the first but perhaps with more Uplyme attacks thanks to the big boot of Anthony Simes kicking downhill to his strikers - notably Armytage and Kyle Knight. Knight made many runs on the left and got in several shots but each was ably saved by the Ottery keeper. Uplyme’s keeper was not so busy in the second half thanks to the defensive pairing of Connor Pemberton and Simes both of whose speed and determination prevented any serious breakthrough. Despite all the attacking play from both sides there was no score in the second half and the final whistle saw the score remaining at 1 - 1 and heralded enthusiastic applause and cheering from supporters of both sides. Both teams should be proud of their performances.